In my Hometown of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, the Post Gazette is the lifeline of Pittsburghers and our daily activities, tragedies, and triumphs. In an article written by jack Kelly, titled, “Remnants of Slavery”. Mr. Kelly starts his plethora of inaccuracies with the statement of “I’m glad I live in a time of automobiles, air conditioning, indoor plumbing, the Internet and great medical advances.”

First of all. Mr. Kelly, do you realize even that with all of these great luxuries afford to you in the year of 2015, that black churches are being bombed as if it is 1960, that unarmed African American lives are still being taken as if the KKK has simply taken off the white robes and traded them in for blue police uniforms? Or are you so blinded by your white privilege that none of this seems to be racially provoked?

In a sad attempt to sugarcoat slavery and the domino effect it has had on the African American community over the past hundreds of years, Mr. Kelly then begins to state that “Slavery was horrible, but no black American living today has suffered from it. Most are better off than if their ancestors had remained in Africa.” What we have here is a sheltered individual who has never had to deal with the oppression put forth on the African American community caused by a system that was never built to position its African American people towards the same comfortability of life as a Caucasian American. In a sense, his message gives off the vibe that we should be grateful that we went through slavery. (Gee, Thanks again, white America).

As if Kelly didn’t show how blinded and insensitive his life was already, he then continues his rant full of racist undertones with probably one of the worst “I have a black friend” statements to try to plead his case of not being racist and biased with: “but slaves in the American South and the British Caribbean (usually) were treated less harshly than in most other places where slavery has been practiced — especially in ancient times.”

Correct me if I’m wrong, but, Mr. Kelly are you trying say that our ancestors are lucky to have gone through the American slave trade and not somewhere else? Wow, how lucky we are to have gone through the Middle Passage for years, dying before we even reached the shores of America, being sold and separated from our families, being considered three-fifths of a human, killed for trying to read and write, and most of all now living with the institutionalized mistreatment of African Americans on a daily basis.

To see this piece written, approved by editors, and then published is baffling. But how surprised should we really be? Mr. Kelly may have just brought all the thoughts and dinner time conversations of many white conservatives to the forefront for all to read. And here I am, bringing the offended, and disgusted response of an African American collegiate woman simply fed up with the “get over it, it didn't happen to you” mindset of America. So to you Mr, Kelly I say: if you don’t see the problem with anything you’ve said in your terribly and inconsiderately written article, you sir, are the problem itself.